Chương 6
Frank has the full list.
I only copied what I could.
The storage key is for locker 214 at Piedmont Self Storage on Old Mill Road.
Frank paid cash six months at a time under the name F. Turner.
If they know you have this, they will come for it.
Do not confront them alone.
The last sentence had been underlined twice.
My mother sat down on the nearest stool.
I looked at June.
“Why didn’t you bring this sooner?”
Her mouth tightened.
“You mean before or after my brother wrapped his truck around a pine tree?”
The room changed again.
“Car accident?”
“Single vehicle.”
I heard Marcus breathe out behind me.
“What road?”
“Not Route 9.”
June gave a humorless smile.
“That would’ve been too obvious.”
“When?”
“Eleven months after Frank.”
“Was Raymond drinking?”
“He’d been sober nine years.”
“Police report?”
“Said speed.”
“Who investigated?”
“You already know.”
Sheriff Harper.
I did not say it.
Nobody needed me to.
My mother stared at the notebook page as if it might rearrange itself into something survivable.
“Raymond never told me.”
“He was scared of you.”
“Of me?”
“Of what you would do if you knew.”
My mother laughed once.
It came out broken.
“I would have called Don.”
June looked at her.
“Exactly.”
That silenced her.
I unfolded the map.
It showed the old industrial corridor west of town.
Piedmont Self Storage was circled in red ink.
I remembered the place vaguely, long rows of beige metal doors near an abandoned textile mill.
“Is it still there?”
June nodded.
“Different owner now.”
“Locker still active?”
“I don’t know.”
“Has anyone checked?”
“No.”
I looked at the key in my palm.
Marcus said, “We need to assume somebody else knows about it.”
“Why?”
“Because Raymond knew.”
“Raymond’s dead.”
“People talk before they die.”
June gave him a hard look.
“My brother did not give Wade anything.”
“I didn’t say he did.”
“You meant it.”
“I meant we don’t know.”
That answer irritated her, which made me trust him more.
Marcus did not care whether she liked him.
He cared whether we made a stupid assumption.
I slid the papers back into the envelope.
“We’re going to the storage facility.”
My mother stood.
“No.”
“You’re staying here.”
“I mean you’re not going.”
“I am.”
“Then I’m coming.”
“You have one arm.”
“I have a car.”
“You also have seventy-five-year-old bones and a medical discharge sheet you’re ignoring.”
“I’m not a soldier.”
“I noticed.”
She glared at me.
“Do not use that tone.”
“Which tone?”
“The one you used when you were seventeen and thought being louder meant you were right.”
Kayla looked away.
Luis disappeared into the kitchen.
Marcus became intensely interested in the sugar dispenser.
I lowered my voice.
“I don’t want you there.”
“That is not your decision.”
“If someone is watching the locker, I’m not bringing you into it.”
“You brought two SUVs to breakfast.”
“I didn’t.”
Marcus coughed.
My mother pointed at him.
“See?”
He lifted both hands.
“Ma’am, I accept full responsibility for the SUVs.”
“You should.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Something in me nearly laughed.
I did not.
My mother was still furious.
That was better than frightened.
June leaned against the counter.
“Piedmont has cameras.”
“Working ones?”
“Owner put in new systems last year after somebody stripped copper out of six units.”
“That helps.”
Marcus shook his head.
“It helps later.”
I looked at him.
“It does not make walking into a potentially compromised storage unit safer.”
“No.”
“Then what?”
“Call the owner first.”
“Tell him why?”
“Tell him enough to verify whether the unit exists and whether anyone has accessed it recently.”
I disliked the delay.
That was exactly why it was probably the right move.
Kayla put a hand over her mouth suddenly.
“What?”
She stared at the front windows.
A pickup truck was parked across the road beside the pharmacy.
Dark blue.
Engine running.
One man inside.
Nothing remarkable about it except that he had been there before June arrived.
“I saw that truck this morning,” Kayla said.
“Where?”
“Outside my apartment.”
Marcus was already moving.
“Everybody stay inside.”
He went through the front door before I could stop him.
The pickup pulled away.
Not fast.
That was worse.
Whoever was driving did not panic.
Marcus stepped into the road long enough to watch the plate.
Then he came back inside.
“Did you get it?”
“Partial.”
“State?”
“North Carolina.”
“Driver?”
“Male, baseball cap, maybe forties.”
June looked at the envelope in my hand.
“Wade knows.”
“Maybe.”
She stared at me.
“Your friend likes that word.”
“He’s irritating.”
“I heard that,” Marcus said.
“Good.”
My mother went behind the register and reached for the phone.
“What are you doing?”
“Calling Don.”
“No.”
Her hand stopped.
“Why not?”
“Because if Harper is involved, telling him we have Raymond’s note gives away exactly what we know.”
Her eyes flashed.
“So we do nothing?”
“We preserve it.”
“That is doing nothing with paperwork.”
“No, it isn’t.”
“To people like you, maybe.”
There it was.
People like you.
I knew what she meant.
People with systems.
People who believed documentation could eventually force truth into the open.
People who had not spent six years living down the road from the men they feared.
“What would you rather do?”
She opened her mouth.
Then closed it.
I waited.
Finally she said, “I don’t know.”
The anger went out of her so quickly that I wished it had stayed.
I stepped closer.
“We don’t have to know everything this morning.”
“We should’ve known six years ago.”
“Yes.”
She looked at me.
The answer surprised her.
I did not defend myself.
There was no useful defense.
June cleared her throat.
“I can call the storage owner.”
“You know him?”
“Everybody knows everybody around here until it becomes inconvenient.”
“What’s his name?”
“Sam Patel.”
Marcus nodded.
“Use your phone.”
June frowned.
“Why?”
“Because if Nicole calls, it creates a connection we don’t need yet.”
May you like
“You think Wade is monitoring calls?”
“I think we don’t know what Wade is monitoring.”
